A95X Plus Amlogic S905Y2 Quad Core Android 8.1 4K TV Box

A95X Plus Amlogic S905Y2 Review

Now the A95X line for 2018 into 2019 has been producing some really great boxes on the new Amlogic S905X2 CPU. However, they released this TV box called the A95X Plus Amlogic S905Y2. Now the “Y2” is what caught my attention, so I ordered this box to just to see what is this Y2 all about and if it was a totally different CPU. Another feature is the Dvalin MP2 GPU. We have seen this CPU and GPU specification being posted in product descriptions of all the latest S905X2 boxes being released, but in my reviews I discovered that it’s actually the S905X2 and Mali G31 that is used in these boxes. That is why I was curious to see the specs of this model. Is it any different? Well let’s take a look at the results.

$54.99 $66.51

$49.99 now for 4GB+32GB

Hardware Specifications

CPU: Amlogic S905 Y2 Cortex A53 Quad Core 1.7GHz

GPU: Mali-G31

RAM: 4GB DDR4

RAM Type: DDR4

ROM: 32GB

WiFi – 2.4Ghz + 5.8Ghz

Bluetooth – 4.1

From my AIDA64 results I discovered that the hardware of the A905X plus is the same Amlogic S905X2 and Mali G31 GPU used in all the latest models. However, this is a good thing because this hardware has been performing well for 2019 thus far and has produced better benchmarks than the Rockchip Rk3328 that we saw used in lots of TV boxes in 2018.

IO interface and Housing design

The A95X Plus adopts the same housing and IO ports design as the Xaomi Mi Box S with it’s very slim design and glossy surface. It also adopts the limited ports offering only ports to the back. The bottom of the box has no ventilation holes so be mindful of where you place this to a allow adequate ventilation.

IO ports:

1 HDMI

1 USB 2.0

1 USB 3.0

1 SPDIF audio out

1 DC input

Operating System and UI

So the A95X line of TV boxes has a great programmer. All their boxes including this one comes some unique features. The operating system on this box is Android 8.1 Oreo and the advanced settings area comes with a root switch, allowing you to turn root access on and off when ever you like. Simply use the switch and restart the box to activate the desired mode. I am a big fan of the A95X launchers, they always have a navigation bar and notifications bar for multitasking. Something also unique to A95X boxes is the ability to change the large buttons on the launcher, something other boxes don’t provide. It comes with a one click memory clean up button and a clock an weather widget, well I couldn’t get the weather widget to work no matter how much cities i entered into it.

Streaming / Netflix / 4K Video Playback

The A95X Plus lives up to it’s name and delivers beautifully when it comes to streaming movies and TV shows. I ran Netflix and it works, however, due to the lack of required DRM support Netflix only shows in standard quality. I installed all the addons provided by the K-addons app to TVMC which is Kodi 17 skin and a wide array of addons populated the TVMC addons section. I have tested them and I was able to stream movies in HD quality. The box comes with YouTube Android TV version that plays in 4K quality, I tried an 8k video but the limit is 1080p. I also ran my usual set of 4K video samples and most of them played really well even the difficult jellyfish video at 400Mbps bit rate. One video gave some playback issues and that was a Cambodia video from my list.

3D Gaming and Gamepad Key-mapping

The 3D gaming performance was again great on this box because it is actually the Mali G31 GPU. I was hoping to see the Dvalin MP2 but that is not the case in this box. The GPU can handle all the top Android with Open GL ES 3.2 support. This allowed me to run all the necessary benchmarks that require open GL ES 3.2.

Benchmarks

Antutu – 55919

Geekbench 4 – 708 Single Core 2110 Multicore

Ice Storm Extreme – 4775

SlingShot Test – 500

RAM Copy – 3331 MB/s

ROM Speed – 61 MB/s read 57 MB/s write

WiFi Speed – 5G MAX speed. 2.4GHz fell slightly below Max speed

Final Thoughts

The A95X Plus in my opinion runs on the same Amlogic S905X2 hardware. It’s a great performing TV box with good movie streaming and 3D gaming. They should have at least include an Ethernet port for users who cannot use WiFi or those who prefer to use LAN connection.